What To Eat Now: is canned food good for us?

The ethos of healthy eating - lean protein, fresh fruits and vegetables, some dairy, as little sugar or alcohol as you can manage - seems to be all about fresh foods. But what about tinned food, where does that ﬁt into a healthy diet?

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Food in cans used to have an aura of general poor quality but that's not always the case these days. If you know what to buy then you can have a few cans in your store-cupboard on standby which mean you can have a healthy meal, which is low in fat, rich in protein and ﬁbre, all for under £2 per person, and ready in 20 minutes - of which 19 is simmering.

Beans can be found in cans, pre-cooked and in plain water, for less than £1 (even the organic versions are pretty good value). You can also buy cooked ratatouille, peas, carrots, mixed vegetables etc - just take my advice and make sure you buy the ones that are in water only. Not salted or sugared water, simply plain water. Some recipes have sugar in the list of ingredients but I checked several cans at random and only a few contained sugar and even then it was less than 1 per cent so not worth worrying about. If it's listed quite early on in the list of ingredients then put it back and ﬁnd one that contains just the vegetable or bean with water.

Let's say you have a can of mixed or butter beans and one can of ratatouille. Drain the water away, empty contents of both cans into a saucepan and then rinse four tablespoons of either brown, Basmati or (if you have nothing else) white rice or quinoa in a sieve and add to the beans and vegetables.

Then add 100ml of boiling water, and season with half a stock cube, or a teaspoon of powdered vegetable stock.